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 (Bloomberg Opinion) -- For the second time in three years, Saudi Arabia is slashing the volume of crude it's sending to America in an attempt to force down stockpiles in the world's most visible oil market and thereby hasten the rebalancing of supply and demand.Weekly U.S. oil inventory data — usually published on a Wednesday and covering the period up to the previous Friday — is routinely pored over by oil analysts and traders alike. Despite their shortcomings, the figures give the most up-to-date picture of changes in the oil balance and influence trading decisions and crude prices around the world.Shifts in the flow of crude into and out of American ports can have a big impact on the level of U.S. inventories. Riyadh has clearly decided it's time to do its bit to bring them down from heights reached in May and June, when the coronavirus pandemic and the kingdom's own output hike combined to drive the fastest ever surge in U.S. commercial crude stockpiles. In the five weeks between March 20 and April 24, the inventories increased at a rate of 2.1 million barrels a day and by the first week of June it was hitting new highs.Excess stockpiles act as a drag on oil prices and the most visible stockpiles are in the U.S. because the Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration reports levels weekly. That's in stark contrast to other places around the world where the data are much less timely, if they are published at all. China, for example, stopped divulging official data on inventory levels in 2017.It's no wonder then that
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 (Bloomberg) -- Former national security adviser Susan Rice, a Netflix director, sold some of her shares of the video streaming company worth $305,323 this week as speculation swirls that she is among the candidates to be Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden's running mate.A spokeswoman for Rice said the sale was unrelated to politics and was made under a stock trading plan she filed more than three months ago under Securities and Exchange Commission rules."Ambassador Rice's sale of a fraction of her Netflix stock has nothing to do with VP speculation," Erin Pelton said.Rice, who also served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, is being vetted as a possible running mate for Biden. He's expected to announce his choice next week.The share sales followed the exercise of options and were disclosed in an SEC filing Thursday night. Netflix stock has nearly doubled in the past year. Rice, who was named to the company's board in 2018, exercised her options at $508.68. As a Netflix board member since 2018, Rice receives 125 stock options a month as part of her compensation package.Rice's net worth was somewhere between $14.7 million and $28.5 million, according to a 2016 financial disclosure statement she made as President Barack Obama's national security adviser. Those assets do not include her two homes, and her husband Ian Cameron's inherited wealth could make their family's assets significantly larger.(Updates with details in fifth paragaph)For more articles like this, please
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Tensions with China seeped further into the market Friday as the U.S.-China trade deal returned to the picture, and deep losses for chipmaker Intel (INTC, -16.2%) didn't help, either.
In a Thursday coronavirus briefing, President Donald Trump said the pact "means less to me now than it did when I made it" as he continues to lay blame on China for the COVID-19 breakout. That, as well as China's demand that the U.S. close its Chengdu consulate - a retaliatory measure for a similar American order earlier this week - helped crack investor confidence.
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Senate Republicans' fiscal stimulus proposal was delayed again, too, with a reveal now expected on Monday.
Intel was a particular drag following its Thursday evening earnings report, when it admitted that its next-generation CPUs will be released six months later than expected.
"We believe the company's delay of its 7nm roadmap will foster fears of competitive pressures persisting, if not accelerating over the next 2-3 years and thereby cap the valuation on its shares," wrote Deutsche Bank analyst Ross Seymore, who downgraded the stock from Buy to Hold. "While INTC has successfully proven that it can generate solid revenue and earnings growth despite being behind on Moore's Law (a trend that likely persists into 2021), we believe fears of the announced 6-month 7nm delay extending to a 10nm-esque multi-year issue that eventually does impact fundamentals will likely keep INTC's shares range-bound until the company definitively proves otherwise."
The uncertainty was a boon for gold, which continued its breako
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